This invention pertains to improvements in starter drive assemblies for internal combustion engines having an overrunning clutch.
Drive assemblies of the type under consideration present a problem in that their overrunning clutches last only a relatively short time when the internal combustion engine malfunctions, for example, in the presence of frequent backfires, mechanical jamming, and the like, or in the event that successive impacts are sustained by the components upstream and downstream from the drive assembly.
These anomalies generate torque in excess of the maximum value produced by the starter motor, so that clamping of the rollers between the outer housing of the overrunning clutch and inner track thereof occurs due to overloading, causing said housing and track to deteriorate.
Before overrunning clutches were used in starter drive assemblies, the latter were equipped with automatic engaging and disengaging devices instead, but, of course, such assemblies were much less advantageous than assemblies using an overrunning clutch. A clutch system of this type was described in French Pat. No. 805.562 dated Apr. 30, 1936.
Since an overrunning clutch with rollers has come into common use to release the drive pinion of a starter for the large gear of a thermal engine when the latter is started, a way has never been found to avoid the problems mentioned above.